The Tesla Motors Model S

The Vanadium redox battery is the most viable candidate I'm aware of (though I haven't done a lot of research). The Wikipedia article there says a fair bit about the pluses and minuses.

Unless they can come up with a better way to dissolve the ions than sulfuric acid, there's no way to get this to consumer-level technology. Interesting that it's actually in use, mostly in Japan, though. It can't be pretty if a holding tank is breached -- that would be a lot of highly concentrated sulfuric acid spilling all over the place.

Even if that particular technology doesn't work, the general idea of liquid batteries doesn't seem at all far-fetched. Presumably batteries contain some positive and negative "stuff" that contains the charge, separated by an insulator. I remember breaking open batteries in middle school and finding a caustic paste inside. If that paste were instead liquid, it could be pumped out into another battery, which could be charged, and the charged stuff could be pumped into another battery. The idea seems pretty basic. I suppose if the two liquids were to mix, shit would hit the fan, but I'm not sure that that risk is worse than that of gas catching fire.

The issue is that the liquids themselves are usually very nasty. Even if they don't mix, the materials are seriously toxic--that's why you aren't supposed to throw them in the garbage.

You could build such a scheme (and maybe a much more clever battery design could use a safer liquid, like the one linked earlier), but we'd have to get rid of self-serve stations. New Jersey has the last laugh!

I wonder if the June 20 announcement that Elon talks about is going to be a battery swap system as mentioned here?

Dailytech has a story claiming that the announcement this week is going to be about battery swapping stations. With their track record, I'm going to assume this is just a well informed guess on their part rather than hard information, but I guess we'll have to see.

I am curious now how they would handle two different battery sizes at a swap station- surely they have a better way of handling this other than keeping a stock of both on hand. Is there any way they could do battery swaps as a service that you pay for?

EDIT: Elon's twitter says they will be doing a battery swap."Live pack swap demo on Thurs night at 8pm California time at our design studio in Hawthorne. Seeing is believing.""Video of battery pack swap will be posted to the Tesla website around 9:30pm, so those attending will see this first."

Does anyone have a picture of the underside of a production Model S? It seems like people would have figured out that the batteries were made to be swapped just by looking at how they're attached to the car.

if EVs actually start becoming mainstream, the traditional auto manufacturers have enough resources to utterly dominate the market, and take advantage of economies of scale.

I think you underestimate the amount of inertia existent in large companies. It isnt easy for them to simply turn around and replace their bread and butter with a new technology so easily (look at how long it has taken other car makers to even start competing with the Prius).

Additionally, Tesla is building a strong arsenal of institutional knowledge, as well as patents in the EV field. Let's say both Ford and GM decide to go all in on EVs, but GM decides to use their tech, while Ford decides to license from Tesla. I bet Ford will have a better, cheaper car on the market faster than GM.

Does anyone have a picture of the underside of a production Model S? It seems like people would have figured out that the batteries were made to be swapped just by looking at how they're attached to the car.

Does anyone have a picture of the underside of a production Model S? It seems like people would have figured out that the batteries were made to be swapped just by looking at how they're attached to the car.

I think you underestimate the amount of inertia existent in large companies. It isnt easy for them to simply turn around and replace their bread and butter with a new technology so easily (look at how long it has taken other car makers to even start competing with the Prius).

The Prius was a money-losing proposition for Toyota until well into the second generation. The U.S. domestic automakers rightfully had other priorities at the time, such as propping up the pensioner overhang.

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Additionally, Tesla is building a strong arsenal of institutional knowledge, as well as patents in the EV field. Let's say both Ford and GM decide to go all in on EVs, but GM decides to use their tech, while Ford decides to license from Tesla. I bet Ford will have a better, cheaper car on the market faster than GM.

GM was far, far ahead on BEV tech throughout the 1990s, and built a strong arsenal of institutional knowledge and patents, and even unintentionally caused CARB to mandate their product. Yet the EV1 wasn't popular, nor did it make any money at all, nor come close to payback.

Tesla undoubtedly has a lot of institutional expertise at this point, but that expertise originally came from AC Propulsion five to nine years ago, from whom Tesla licensed their earliest drivetrains. AC Propulsion's technology was improvements on the GM EV1 and 1966 Electrovair, like combining the charger with the controller and taking advantage of industry improvements in power electronics.

The Prius was a money-losing proposition for Toyota until well into the second generation. The U.S. domestic automakers rightfully had other priorities at the time, such as propping up the pensioner overhang.

While I really doubt pensions was the reason American automakers chose to invest in huge gas guzzlers over hybrids, even ignoring the American automakers, what about other Japanese and Korean automakers, who still haven't come close to matching Toyota's market performance in hybrids?

Being first, if you are successful, does have advantages.

And I think the fact that the Prius was money-losing actually supports my point. It is very hard for executives in large companies to invest significant resources in market, at the expense of their current markets, unless it is a proven money-maker. Having to wait for the market to prove itself means that they are already behind the marketing, technological, and consumer mind-share curves. That is exactly what I meant by inertia.

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Additionally, Tesla is building a strong arsenal of institutional knowledge, as well as patents in the EV field. Let's say both Ford and GM decide to go all in on EVs, but GM decides to use their tech, while Ford decides to license from Tesla. I bet Ford will have a better, cheaper car on the market faster than GM.

GM was far, far ahead on BEV tech throughout the 1990s, and built a strong arsenal of institutional knowledge and patents, and even unintentionally caused CARB to mandate their product. Yet the EV1 wasn't popular, nor did it make any money at all, nor come close to payback.

Tesla undoubtedly has a lot of institutional expertise at this point, but that expertise originally came from AC Propulsion five to nine years ago, from whom Tesla licensed their earliest drivetrains. AC Propulsion's technology was improvements on the GM EV1 and 1966 Electrovair, like combining the charger with the controller and taking advantage of industry improvements in power electronics.[/quote]

Electric technology from the 90s isn't comparable to that in the 2000s. GM was ahead of its market and the technology, and the EV1 reflected this.

The comparison is similar to saying that the iPhone would not be successful, or Apple would not be able to profit with it, because Nokia's 7710 failed.

The big difference between Tesla, and GM's EV1, is that Tesla's battery technology is actually successful, while GM's wasn't.

Additionally, Tesla benefits greatly from actually having successfully designed, manufactured, and marketed EVs. This may not necessarily translate to IP, or patents, but is extremely critical for deploying a new product to the market. It gives them a significant edge over someone (even a major company like GM) trying to replicate it from scratch.

The Germans are racing themselves around the ring with EVs right now. They'll release stuff in a few years once the market comes along. There's numerous hybrids coming out now. Audi might put the A3 e-tron into production, but it'd be a terrible EV, IMO. (because low range and slow as hell)

While I really doubt pensions was the reason American automakers chose to invest in huge gas guzzlers over hybrids, even ignoring the American automakers, what about other Japanese and Korean automakers, who still haven't come close to matching Toyota's market performance in hybrids?

Pensioners, general loss of marketshare, and for GM the two billion dollars required to shut down Oldsmobile and pay off dealers 2000-2001 certainly guided them towards low-risk, shorter-term profits.

The Prius was a money-losing car for a long time, according to the reverse-engineering that all big automakers do for their competitor's models. Toyota claims it makes money on the Prius because it makes so many components itself, instead of buying them from suppliers as do most automakers (especially those in the U.S.). Toyota also has a flat-rate license on older NiMH technology, which is why the Prius uses those instead of modern lithium-ion cells, although they'll need to update at some point.

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Being first, if you are successful, does have advantages.

Can. Can have advantages. That's why I pointed out the EV1 and the Electrovair (and there are many other BEVs by many other makers, big and small).

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And I think the fact that the Prius was money-losing actually supports my point. It is very hard for executives in large companies to invest significant resources in market, at the expense of their current markets, unless it is a proven money-maker. Having to wait for the market to prove itself means that they are already behind the marketing, technological, and consumer mind-share curves. That is exactly what I meant by inertia.

Inertia makes for a nice story to fill three to seven pages in a popular news-magazine, but that story is superficial and misses many underlying facts.

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Electric technology from the 90s isn't comparable to that in the 2000s. GM was ahead of its market and the technology, and the EV1 reflected this.

EV1 was a single AC induction motor with propshafts to the wheels; both Tesla models to date are the same. EV1 used lead-acid, then NiMH cells in its second generation; Tesla uses lithium-ion cobaltic oxide 18650-size commodity cells as used in contemporary laptops.

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The big difference between Tesla, and GM's EV1, is that Tesla's battery technology is actually successful, while GM's wasn't.

Neither company had its own battery technology. Tesla has battery-management and thermal systems, which are important, but certainly aren't batteries. Tesla buys Panasonic INCR18650s, probably the highest-capacity cells available in quantity today.

Can. Can have advantages. That's why I pointed out the EV1 and the Electrovair (and there are many other BEVs by many other makers, big and small).[/quote]Of course it is a "can". Everything is a "can". There are no guarantees. However, your EV1 and Electrovair "counterpoints" are pointless because of the qualifier that being the first to be "successful" in a field has advantages. Neither of them were successful. And the Model S, by many (but not all, and maybe not even the most important) metrics can be considered successful.

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Inertia makes for a nice story to fill three to seven pages in a popular news-magazine, but that story is superficial and misses many underlying facts.

Is there a point to this statement? Ignore the usage of the word inertia. Do you contest the claim that large successful companies usually find it hard to invest in unproven future markets especially when it involves reducing investments in their current cash cows?

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Electric technology from the 90s isn't comparable to that in the 2000s. GM was ahead of its market and the technology, and the EV1 reflected this.

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EV1 was a single AC induction motor with propshafts to the wheels; both Tesla models to date are the same. EV1 used lead-acid, then NiMH cells in its second generation; Tesla uses lithium-ion cobaltic oxide 18650-size commodity cells as used in contemporary laptops.

And yet no manufacturer, including those who are manufacturing EVs have been able to get cars with the kind of performance that Tesla has. And 2 massive manufacturers (neither of them burdened by those"oh so terrible pensions" in Toyotaand Mercedes have already licensed Tesla EV technology. Why do you think they are paying Tesla if all this is such a piece of cake and just a rehash of 90s American technology (rehashed technology produced by a company so buried under the effort of figuring out how to pay its pensions...).

Innovators Dilemma. And note that the existing manufacturer's customers are the dealers. Who like their customers having to return for oil changes and endless other maintenance. No dealer is begging GM, Toyota etc to make pure EVs.

They did stack the odds quite hugely in the video demo, though. The guy driving to the petrol station in the video must've had fumes left in the tank when he pulled in, and I'd guess most people don't only consider getting fuel when they're very close to empty.

I also noticed a caveat in the promotional blurb about "being billed the difference" if you don't return a battery pack when you swap one out at these stations. I think that might very quickly get expensive; aren't the batteries a significant proportion of the whole cost of the whole vehicle in electrics ?

They did stack the odds quite hugely in the video demo, though. The guy driving to the petrol station in the video must've had fumes left in the tank when he pulled in, and I'd guess most people don't only consider getting fuel when they're very close to empty.

Unless you're a NYT reporter doing a story on the Model S. Why would you get fuel before you are totally empty? Heck, you might not even fill it up all the way when you're at the station.

I dunno anyone who drives and does as you say, conversely. Maybe leaving yourself some margins to avoid getting stranded ? Avoiding sucking up any dregs at the bottom of the tank ? There's quite a few reasons, actually. No.1, however, would probably be "to maximise the time difference in the comparison.".

You haven't addressed the issue of the cost for the new battery swapout, though.

Seems like battery swap would be useful to have available for any unplanned travel that happens to coincide with a low charge. You come back from a long trip, plug in to start recharge, then get a phone call. Now you need to make an unplanned 60 mile round trip. Swap batter for fully charged, make trip, come back a few hours later, get own battery back which is now also fully charged.

On the whole it seemed like a reasonable demonstration, though they did exaggerate a bit:

The Teslas didn't have to waste time authenticating or arranging any sort of payment, while the car at the gas station did. Further, fueling at the station was complete at 3:05, add 10 seconds if you want to count cap in and fuel door closed - yet for some reason they continued running the timer an additional minute before calling it "done". And for a truly honest comparison, they should have been filling the petrol based car for identical range, not "full tank".

That weakens the demo a bit, IMO, which is unfortunate because they didn't need to do that to make their point - which is that with a swap, it's at parity with dumping in fuel.

Nice to see they're addressing that shortcoming though. Now it's just a matter of seeing if it scales.

As for typical refuels on normal cars - I don't know about everyone else, but I fill up the tank once I'm down to ~2 gallons remaining (approx 60-80 miles of range). Though really anywhere under half a tank is fair game, depending.

I dunno anyone who drives and does as you say, conversely. Maybe leaving yourself some margins to avoid getting stranded ? Avoiding sucking up any dregs at the bottom of the tank ? There's quite a few reasons, actually. No.1, however, would probably be "to maximise the time difference in the comparison.".

You haven't addressed the issue of the cost for the new battery swapout, though.

He was poking fun at the NY times reporter who did a piece on the model S and the supercharger stations and did not fill the car even through the car said it did not have enough mileage to get to the next stop.

Is there a video floating around of the battery swap demo? Found it on the Tesla site

Is there any more info on it since the site is lacking other than saying it will cost something.

Also I like that they say it was a 10gal/min pump yet it took 4 mins to pump ~9gals. I do feel that using a car that is on fumes is a valid "test" since the Tesla is leaving with a 100% full pack no matter how empty it is so long as it is capable of getting to the station. And If you have a model S I would assume that (at least currently) you are able to charge it at home/work so the battery swap would be used mainly for longer trips and not normal fill ups. Depending on pricing and locations the battery swap just removed one of the major drawbacks of EVs which is they aren't suited for longer trips since even the superchargers take ~1hrs for a full battery.

I just noticed that now you can see the proposed locations for the super charger stations. I wonder if they are going by where the owners of the cars are since they plan on putting on near Denver by this summer which just seems kinda random since there are no other stations near by.

On the whole it seemed like a reasonable demonstration, though they did exaggerate a bit:

The Teslas didn't have to waste time authenticating or arranging any sort of payment, while the car at the gas station did. Further, fueling at the station was complete at 3:05, add 10 seconds if you want to count cap in and fuel door closed - yet for some reason they continued running the timer an additional minute before calling it "done".

I believe they started the timer when the cars first pulled up and then stopped it when the car left the station which is when they stopped the timers for the two Teslas. But you are right they didn't have to pay or even get out of the cars. It could be possible that since Teslas have to pay a monthly fee anyways that it just reads some serial number or something on the bottom of the Model S and can pull up the account info and you get billed that way.

Also I like that they say it was a 10gal/min pump yet it took 4 mins to pump ~9gals.

You caught part of the price readout. It was $99 something for 23+ gallons at $4.29/gal, IIRC.

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I believe they started the timer when the cars first pulled up and then stopped it when the car left the station which is when they stopped the timers for the two Teslas.

They did, but again, the car at the gas station inexplicably sat there doing absolutely nothing for almost a full minute before attempting to pull away. That was nothing but deck stacking.

While it doesn't significantly alter the overall point, I'd have been more impressed with the demo if they'd been fully honest about it and didn't cheapen it with tricks like that.

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It could be possible that since Teslas have to pay a monthly fee anyways that it just reads some serial number or something on the bottom of the Model S and can pull up the account info and you get billed that way.

Certainly possible, and would be a great way to do it. Though without further details from Tesla on that, I'm not going to be that generous and grant them the assumption.

I believe they started the timer when the cars first pulled up and then stopped it when the car left the station which is when they stopped the timers for the two Teslas.

They did, but again, the car at the gas station inexplicably sat there doing absolutely nothing for almost a full minute before attempting to pull away. That was nothing but deck stacking.

While it doesn't significantly alter the overall point, I'd have been more impressed with the demo if they'd been fully honest about it and didn't cheapen it with tricks like that.

Having watched the end of the video again it looks like the car could have started driving away at 3:50 that doesn't take into account the extra time that appears to have been added at the start and why it took him so long to walk to the car. But really ~90secs to fully swap a battery is still damn good.

Considering this will be an occasional convenience for range extension, and probably only along major highways, it's not a big deal how long it takes. As a bonus, it would be cool to be able to step out of the car while it's done so you can hit the head and wash your hands.

Absolutely agreed, which is why I don't understand why they felt the need to stack the deck and pad the time. Anyone who drives already knows how long it takes to fill up at a gas station, so I don't understand why they tried to turn, "Solved problem" into "See, if we fudge it at every opportunity, it's twice as good!" No, not really. It's impressive, but now you're stretching.

They could have just skipped the side by side 'real time' comparison and it would have been just as impressive, and less distracting from the core point, IMO.

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If you have a smart tracking infrastructure with built in cell communication in each vehicle, I'm sure that having it auto-authenticate isn't going to be a big deal.

Presumably. But they seem to be being a bit coy with the payment details right now. I suppose it could be argued that anyone buying a Model S obviously doesn't care about prices, but the lack of anything in that respect leaves a feeling of "what's the catch?"

Absolutely agreed, which is why I don't understand why they felt the need to stack the deck and pad the time. Anyone who drives already knows how long it takes to fill up at a gas station, so I don't understand why they tried to turn, "Solved problem" into "See, if we fudge it at every opportunity, it's twice as good!" No, not really. It's impressive, but now you're stretching.

They could have just skipped the side by side 'real time' comparison and it would have been just as impressive, and less distracting from the core point, IMO.

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If you have a smart tracking infrastructure with built in cell communication in each vehicle, I'm sure that having it auto-authenticate isn't going to be a big deal.

Presumably. But they seem to be being a bit coy with the payment details right now. I suppose it could be argued that anyone buying a Model S obviously doesn't care about prices, but the lack of anything in that respect leaves a feeling of "what's the catch?"

According to the front page article it will be $60-80 depending on the battery you have. How you are paying for that is still a mystery.

According to the front page article it will be $60-80 depending on the battery you have. How you are paying for that is still a mystery.

Good catch. I'd missed that article.

I imagine you'll have to have an active account with a card on file with Tesla to make use of it. If the cars are data linked, it should be trivial enough to simply have the vehicle report in when a pack gets swapped out. Also, the price seems fairly reasonable considering the current price of gas.

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The only caveat is that drivers must swap back in their original battery pack on their return trip or pay a fee equal to the difference in value between the new and old batteries (there are no details yet on how much this fee might be).

While I can understand why this is required, it considerably reduces the utility of the service. And how exactly does that work? What's the time limit for swapping back to your original battery? Now that I think about it, how many batteries will they have on hand at each station, and what if yours gets swapped out to someone else before you get back? There are definitely some storage and logistical considerations here that make it a bit more complicated than gas.

Not insurmountable, but I could see it being an obstacle as adoption picks up.

EDIT:This could perhaps make owning one while living in an apartment/condo workable. Just swap packs in and out every few days on the way to/from work. However that would pretty much kill some of the biggest selling points of the thing, namely "Don't be tied to stations" and "charging is cheap (free)".

The battery swap solution seems like a good emergency option. Alternatively, for someone trying to make a trip as quickly as they can, the cost may be worth it.

Either way though, I think this plan is intended to have more of a psychological impact than real practical use. Not sure if the cost of installing all these battery swap stations is worth the psychological impact though.

Either way though, I think this plan is intended to have more of a psychological impact than real practical use.

That's my thought as well. Most people are going to do just fine with home charging or the Superchargers most of the time. This would be great in a pinch if you're in a hurry to get from L.A. to San Francisco, but it probably won't be used all that frequently by most owners.

It would suck if you pulled into a rest stop and the 2 Tesla stations are already in use doing charges and you just wanted to swap.

Still overall pretty impressive. The gotcha is on having to pick up your own pack on the return trip. But these are cars for rich people, so maybe it doesn't matter. Now will their next vehicle be limited to having to be serviced by the same stations as the model S? Puts some design/location limitations on the battery packs for the upcoming X.

It would suck if you pulled into a rest stop and the 2 Tesla stations are already in use doing charges and you just wanted to swap.

Still overall pretty impressive. The gotcha is on having to pick up your own pack on the return trip. But these are cars for rich people, so maybe it doesn't matter. Now will their next vehicle be limited to having to be serviced by the same stations as the model S? Puts some design/location limitations on the battery packs for the upcoming X.

Some limitations, but they have already pretty much settled on having a big flat battery pack on the bottom of the vehicle for a variety of design reasons (center of gravity, heat management, et cetera.) NBD, I suspect.

If they are already handling 3 different pack styles and tracking individual packs to reinstall them in the original car, it shouldn't be difficult to add on the packs for the Model X at the same station.

As time goes on, if this service is popular they could easily start a pack swapping service that you buy into for a monthly fee. Somehow separate the battery cost from the car. Nissan has a financing option like that right? If those get to be ubiquitous enough, it would make range a total non-issue. He mentioned they cost around $500k to install, what's the cost of installing a traditional gas station? I bet those are some sophisticated robots, I wonder if they can be calibrated to multiple models? I'd imagine so. Is it just as simple as storing settings for specific models?

Nissan should work with Tesla on this. It would make leafs much cooler if they could just stop at a station like that and swap out real quick.

Now that it's official, I'm very much surprised by this development. The convenience factor is obvious, esp. to people who value their time as I expect anyone who can afford the car does, esp. since the driver can make the choice ad-hoc when they're at the charge/swap station (and I expect the driver will able to see the status of the swap stations (their inventory status,whether's there's a wait) in real time, via the cellular connections, maybe also reserve a swpa in advance).

Thatsaid, while I hadn't been following Tesla that closely, I didn't realize they had ever considered a swapping scheme, let alone designed the cars so it was feasible. The people I talked to at Better Place told me that their requirement to have the battery easily accessible for a swap was a major engineering limitation, and a big reason why they never did get additional car companies beyond Renault onboard (the batteries can't be designed to be space-conformant, and so best use the space available in the car).

Looks like it isn't such a limitation, at least not for one car company with a limited model range; assuming this does happen for real, it's a safe bet Tesla's future models will be able to use the swapping stations as well.

In fact, if it ends up being popular with Tesla drivers, at least the higher-end EVs from other vendors may very well end up being able to use Tesla's stations too. The convenience factor of this scheme may otherwise be too much of a competitive advantage for Tesla, and once they have a network of stations, it may be too expensive for other vendors to roll their own rather than pay Tesla to use theirs. This holds specially true for a manufacturer like Mercedes who's already buying the EV drivetrains from Tesla.

Through that article makes it sound like it is a 2way swap. So you drive to some station swap the battery then drive there again (on the way back) and get your battery back.

That would be surprising, especially given that there is essentially an unlimited warranty on the batteries now that for all practical purposes means that Tesla already owns the battery.

Yes, the "need to return the battery" certainly sounds inelegant.In fact, I'm a bit surprised that together with this they didn't intro a parallel "Tesla owns the battery" ownership model, a bit like Better Place's. You buy the car without battery for less, and instead, lease it on a monthly basis. In case of a swap, you'd stay with the swapped-in battery so no need to swap back.Tesla would guarantee you a certain minimum performance from the battery, so you wouldn't care which battery is in there, and swapping station could also be used from a maintenance perspective, to make sure people are getting full use of the batteries and maintaining a high satisfaction level.This ownership model would be an option, so a buyer could always decide they prefer buying the battery outright.

Hmm... the need to return the battery seems kludgy enough that I suspect they will offer a battery leasing model, assuming the swap stations work out.EDIT:Missed Boneman's post.

Incidentally, over here, a typical gas station costs $1M-$2M to build. The environmental requirements are pretty strict, so the underground gasoline storage is expensive.The Better Place swap stations, according to folks inside the company, cost ~$500K apiece. I don't know how much this reflects any needed electric company added trunk lines if they're not very close.

This is after they'd built ~40, and matches what they said publicly, so is probably a reasonable ballpark (and the BP ones are very similar to what Tesla appears to be planning: A carwash-type tunnel, a robot doing the job from underneath, the process taking a couple of minutes).

Interestingly, this suggests to me it makes sense for EV charge/swap stations to be piggybacked onto existing gas stations. The other facilities (food, restrooms etc.) are after all the same, and even some of the automotive services (tires, carwashes).

I would guess they're probably going to have the most difficulties with maintaining appropriate stocks of charged batteries initially, however. Like any custom piece of equipment, they need to be built, and then kept charged at the swap-stations which means they'll need a goodly number of replacements.

It's pretty easy to calculate how many batteries they would need to keep on hand based on the maximum throughput. I'm going to ignore the "must return and reclaim your car's own battery" thing here.

A swap take 1.5 minutes. It takes an hour to bring a just-swapped-out drained battery to fully charged. In that hour, they could have at most 60/1.5 = 40 cars come through a single swap-machine lane. Thus, to keep up with the full throughput that the station can service, they need an inventory of 40 batteries and the attendant equipment to charge them at that rate.

I wonder if they can make out-of-car charging faster with better thermal management and tighter tolerances on the electronics and their connections?

That's a massive overestimate given how many cars they've actually sold. It might make sense for a location in the San Francisco-to-San Jose area, where Tesla density might be high enough. But for most places they don't need nearly that many.

In fact, I'm a bit surprised that together with this they didn't intro a parallel "Tesla owns the battery" ownership model, a bit like Better Place's. You buy the car without battery for less, and instead, lease it on a monthly basis. In case of a swap, you'd stay with the swapped-in battery so no need to swap back.Tesla would guarantee you a certain minimum performance from the battery, so you wouldn't care which battery is in there, and swapping station could also be used from a maintenance perspective, to make sure people are getting full use of the batteries and maintaining a high satisfaction level.This ownership model would be an option, so a buyer could always decide they prefer buying the battery outright.

I think the problem is that people aren't comfortable with depreciation on a leased part. They're likely to demand their battery retain its full capacity at all times, or swap it for one that does. If we accepted 20% degradation as the threshold for battery replacement under warranty, people understand that their owned 85Kwh battery will diminish to that point over time. But if they have a leased battery, get swapped in a 70Kwh part and are told "It's within spec" they're going to be angry and blame Tesla I think.Also, this would be a pretty capital intensive change, and Tesla doesn't have a lot of spare capital.